roman
#275 – Aericus Amor
Born 41 AD in Rome, Aericus is a senator masquerading as an actor to be closer to his forbidden love, a pleb Philetus, star of Virgil’s Aeneid.
RomanPunks is a retrofuturistic, cyberpunk derivative world-building project inspired by fine art, history and the cryptopunk movement.
A total of 1,000 RomanPunk characters have been frozen in time and minted as Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs) on the Ethereum, WAX, Polygon and Algorand blockchains.
RomanPunk characters are comprised of commoners and famous individuals based on Roman history, art history and pop culture.
The basis for RomanPunk lore and backstories is exhaustively researched by history/sci-fi buff and co-founder, Punktavian.
All images are drawn by hand by woman artist and co-founder, Cleopunktra, without the aid of AI or generative tools.
RomanPunks came into existence through early minting on OpenSea, promoting on Twitter and building a Discord community through giveaways and engagement. The idea of a cyberpunk-derivative ‘RomanPunk’ theme was in our heads for years, but it was the success of the Cryptopunks that became the catalyst for project conception and launch.
After a hard working first 60 days spent networking and attracting new collectors to RomanPunks, our community had begun to flourish and sales increased. We began to offer our collectors an opportunity to battle their NFTs in a tournament bracket powered by dice rolls.
Encouraged by the tight knit community and the carbon-neutral blockchain with lightning fast and low cost transactions, we launched 'romanpunksio' collection on WAX Blockchain as the first step to expand the backstories of our RomanPunk characters and the baseline for future development of a card game.
RomanPunks integrated with Chainlink Labs to utilize VRF (Verified Randomness Function) to host a giveaway raffle for our holders. We developed a smart contract on Ethereum which guarantees true random number selection on chain and can be used for a wide range of functions that require random selection.
After much anticipation in the community, we released our first WAX NFT card 'pack' through the Neftyblocks platform, which sold out in less than a week.
We launched our Twitch channel and begun building an audience by offering numerous giveaways of WAX NFTs from our collection, as well as giving participants a chance to win RomanPunk ETH NFT airdrops for taking top spot at the end of the 'season'.
As firm believers in a metaverse future and land owners in The Sandbox, we undertook to build the RomanPunk Colosseum on 1x1 land and entered our experience "Gladiator Bloodsport" into a GameJam contest. We will continue to build the Colosseum into a PVP arena and social hub once The Sandbox offers creators the ability to do so.
Thanks to the user friendly tools offered by NeftyBlocks, we launched a comprehensive blending system on WAX, allowing our collectors to blend the common NFTs they earn in our Discord RPG up into Legendary famous NFTs through the use of blending 'coins' that can also be earned on the Discord as reward for helping to promote the RomanPunks project.
We launched the VX collection on Polygon. Each owner of an ETH NFT gets their voxel equivalent airdropped to them, and these NFTs can be redeemed for official NFTs on The Sandbox Marketplace once available.
All 1,000 original, unique 1:1 RomanPunk characters hand drawn by Cleopunktra and minted on OpenSea.
The RomanPunk WAX NFT Trading Card Fighter Pack Series II consists of 3 NFTs randomly selected from over 236 characters.
Upcoming plans for RomanPunks include:
Below is a comprehensive and searchable directory of all 1,000 RomanPunk Characters.
Born 41 AD in Rome, Aericus is a senator masquerading as an actor to be closer to his forbidden love, a pleb Philetus, star of Virgil’s Aeneid.
Born 2185 AD in Corduba, Xylo is an interdimensional RTS gaming prodigy and former techno-slave who hacked his way to freedom. Cocky and self-absorbed, Xylo lived only for the thrill of the game until a rebellion led by a cloned Hannibal Barca tried to recruit him in the fight against the cyborg Emperor Caligula. Not wanting to jeopardize his lucrative career, he refused, until a scandal contrived by a corrupt governor shattered his reputation. Now, with nothing left to lose, Xylo reluctantly joins the fight, piloting a Xena-class mech in the battle for Neo-Carthage. Xylo plays by his own rules, driven less by loyalty than by the thrill of proving that the system is his to control—and burn.
Born 212 AD in Hispalis, Maxim was slave to a cyborg patrician. Upon learning of his master’s secret he was sent to the gladiator pits; skilled with a knife, became a successful fan favourite who always fought with slurpee in hand.
Born 170 BC in Damascus, Daro is a bastard son of Antiochus IV and a time-traveling geisha from the 22nd century. Now, Daro travels across dimensions in search of his biological mother.
Born 2177 AD in Tridentum, Vayla, a server at an opulent hotel tiki bar in Neo-Carthage, is driven by grief and a fierce determination to seek justice for her murdered cyborg lover, Hecate Cybernius. Intelligent and resilient, Vayla becomes deeply involved in the investigation led by two vigilantes. Her resourcefulness, thirst for retribution and loyal Doberman, Ares, make her a crucial ally in the quest to expose the influential killer. Through her involvement in the plot, Vayla embodies the themes of loss, courage, and the relentless pursuit of truth in a dystopian world.
Born 209 BC in Ancyra, Cinderella and her husband, Artox, were transported by unknown forces to the 33rd century AD where she manages his cyber x-games career and operates a lucrative gambling ring.
Born 199 AD to a wealthy druid, Cormac is a time-traveling technocratic troubadour who writes propaganda pamphlets that are propagated interdimensionally to buttress the Empire and quell revolt.
Born 277 AD in Petra, Ruth was sentenced to death for sacrificing children to Pluto. She opted to die by glory and face an impossibly difficult opponent to the death in the gladiator arena.
Born 2103 AD in Neo-Galway, Saoirse is an interdimensionally famous metaverse model, actress and notorious recluse who is known to send AI robot clones of herself to IRL social events while she dwells in her digital domain.
Born in 261 AD in Olisipo, Dobiteina and her husband Arco are time slaves who toiled as resurrection gladiators in a distant time and place. After living thousands of lifetimes, they escaped and returned to the 3rd century AD where they triumphed with advanced tactics and equipment in the colosseum.
Born in 255 BC in Hecatompylos, Helya, a direct descendant of Alexander the Great, was a Parthian emissary who learned martial arts in China, later becoming a great warrior who singlehandedly rooted out and eliminated a cohort of dimension hopping alien invaders.
Born 166 BC in Carthage as a barracks slave, Gene was freed by Gaius Marius after saving his life during the Jugurthine Wars, becoming a loyal bodyguard to the Consul.
Born 103 BC in Perinthus, Deif was a slave who toiled as an interdimensional drug mule until freed by his degenerate equestrian master who had an epiphany on Ayahuasca. Now Deif procures a cornucopia of psychedelic substances for Elektrosar, the timeless EDM festival that runs sempiternally in the ancient Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
Born in 169 AD in Meroë, Sami is a warrior priest who spent his life fighting against incursions from Roman Egypt, using the dimensional portal in the Pyramid of Amanishakheto to invoke the technological support of alien masters from a distant future galaxy.
Born 3783 AD in Londinium, J.R. is a dimension hopping playboy who frequents posh, underground nightclubs to prey on rebellious beautiful women in search of freedom through time.
